


How do you like your dessert?

by pararanch



Category: Thai Actor RPF, เกลียดนักมาเป็นที่รักกันซะดีๆ | TharnType: The Series (TV), เกลียดนักมาเป็นที่รักกันซะดีๆ | TharnType: The Series (TV) RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Boys In Love, But both of them are clueless, Dessert & Sweets, Eventual Fluff, Eventual Relationships, Eventual Romance, Love/Hate, M/M, Mutual Pining, Romance, and totally in denial
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-03
Updated: 2020-12-14
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:00:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 15,380
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27858706
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pararanch/pseuds/pararanch
Summary: The tale of Gulf Kanawut, a chocolatier who didn't really like sweets, and Mew Suppasit who always come to the café where he worked at because he was a sweet tooth. And apparently it irked Gulf that the older one's appearance made the girls coming to his café endlessly.
Relationships: Mew Suppasit Jongcheveevat/Gulf Kanawut Traipipattanapong
Comments: 34
Kudos: 189





	1. Why he always come to this place, again?

**Author's Note:**

> Russia translation: [here](https://ficbook.net/readfic/10343248)

“Stop staring,” Tong, the head pâtissier said flatly as he repeatedly folding his butter into the dough to make danish pastry.

“I’m _not_ staring,” The tall, slightly tanned boy huffed as he put his focus back to slowly heating and cooling the melted chocolate while stirring and puts it into temper.

“Just focus on tempering the chocolate, it’s a freaking Valrhona Ai’Nong, don’t waste it,” The pastry chef sighed as he put back the wrapped dough to the fridge after he washed his hands. “For someone that apparently didn’t care much, you certainly put so much attention to one of our regulars.”

“I’m not???” The chocolatier of the pastry shop retorted back, definitely feeling offended.

The older one just raised his eyebrows skeptically while shrugged silently as he put out the freshly baked croissant to the display glass with attentive because first impression in the display really matters to make customers interested.

“Well, Phi, don’t you feel annoyed that he come here almost everyday just to take a seat almost for the entire morning till afternoon and just order one pastry and one beverage every single time?” He put the melted dark chocolate to the truffle molds carefully before he tapped the excess chocolate back. “His seat could’ve taken by other customers so that we could achieve higher average sales per day, you see.”

“Since when do you care much about our average sales per day?” The older one leaned back at the cashier, as he waiting for the matcha croissant loaf to finished baking.

“Since our sales manager been nagging around because we haven’t improved our sales much,” He filled another truffle molds before he let them set at the fridge, and move out the already set one and filled it with chocolate mouse and nuts. “And apparently he’s been saying that our branch lost in terms of sales to the one in Siam.”

“It’s not our fault, though, it comes to a default that the sales would be much higher in Siam, given with all the crowds,” He smiled and said thank you politely as one of customer was walking to his way to put back her plate and empty cup to the open kitchen corner and exited their pastry shop.

“But we definitely could improve our sales if that person not staying that long and give his seat to another customer that actually want to purchase our bake goods.”

“But, we can’t deny that his appearance attracted a lot of new female customers, right?” Tong moved the previous customer’s dirty plate to the back kitchen, so that the intern would clean it. “You see, ever since he comes here often, our tables always full with customers. If you say that we need to improve our sales, then he’s like some kind of free marketing gimmick that we never asked before.” He chuckled at the younger one that still busy filling the molds with chocolate mousse.

“Those ‘new customers’ that you’ve been saying — I don’t need such customers that barely touch our desserts just because they need to buy one so that they could watch him here all day,” Gulf turned his eyes to the said customer annoyedly and rolled his eyes. “I need customers that genuinely interested to coming to our place because they _actually_ wanted to eat our cakes and desserts and _actually_ finished it.”

“You know, as much as I was avoiding talking about our customers... you do know how most girls always been on diet 24/7 right? They must be just want a little dessert here and there and didn’t want to gain any weight, which was why they sometimes didn’t finished it,” Tong shrugged as he took a deep sighed because he was sad such customers actually existed.

“That excuse still didn’t make sense. Since when society deemed that people who barely finished their food to be a good one? My mom always thought me to finished our food, Phi.”

“Still a better one, rather than having customers that actually have eating disorders, though,” The older one moved to take away the freshly baked pastries from the oven and put it into the counter to let it cool down before he could filled it with pastry cream and decorate it. “I won’t say that it’s all because our cakes taste bad, because we are so proud that we actually won many awards, and we always have high ratings on those food reviews apps.”

“It’s certainly _not_ because our pastries taste bad, Phi,” The younger one snapped annoyedly as he put pistachios to the molds carefully. “We’re not taking those years of education at culinary school and training to make a bad food.”

“Excuse me.”

The foreign voice of the customer made both of them looked up at him. _Yeah, right_. That particular customer that they had been talking about. The one with that sculpted jaw and slanted sharp eyes. Not that Gulf cared so much about it.

“Thank you, I already finished,” He put his dirty plate and empty cup at the corner. “Ah, anyway, the white chocolate green tea mousse that I’ve tried today tasted really good.” He smiled kindly to both of the staffs before he turned back to exited the café. The young chocolatier just stay silent whilst the pâtissier thanking him politely.

“He heard us earlier, doesn’t he?”

“The last part, definitely. Which is why he specifically praised the dessert that you made, Nong,” Tong snorted as he put back the dirty dishes to the back kitchen.

The young chocolatier silently watching through the arrays of cereal boxes at the supermarket. Ironically, given with his daily job at the pastry shop, he barely could eat any sweets, especially the cheap, artificial flavoured one like these cereals. But sometimes he didn’t have enough time to whipped up some quick breakfast since he had to woke up and go to the dessert café early in the morning. A quick breakfast with a long shelf life would sounds nice because he also barely had time to stocked up fresh groceries every single week. Ironic and sad, yes, but unfortunately, most chefs and anyone who worked at the kitchen always been someone that eat the most unhealthiest food, without any proper eating schedule, even. Which was why he decided that he took job as a chocolatier in a speciality dessert café rather than in big restaurant or hotel, or else, he will given even worse schedule there.

Upon seeing the colourful boxes of Lucky Charms, Oreo’o, and Reese’s Puffs, he pondered a bit should he buy oatmeal instead, since he could already imagine how all of these would raise his blood sugar early in the morning. But, _nah_ , he also didn’t like the bland taste of oatmeal, either. Therefore he reached out for a good old Corn Flakes, the one that he could still gulped down for breakfast, even if it wasn’t the most nutritious one. It startled him that his hand bumped into someone that wanted to pick up the same Corn Flakes box.

Which of course, given with Gulf Kanawut and his utmost luck upon his life choices, of course it would be that customer that he literally been annoyed for a couple of months already, with his freshly dyed blue highlight hair — _not that he really cared, still_. He just nodded politely and picked up other boxes of cereal randomly just because he wanted to walked out from this place immediately.

“N’Gulf?”

“Uh,” He startled again when he wanted to go to the cashier and turned back to the cereal aisle. Oh. It was his neighbor at the apartment. “Sawatdee, P’Mild, sorry I didn’t see you earlier,” He wai the older one, trying ignore the fact that his neighbor standing beside the said regular at the pastry shop.

“Sawatdee na Nong, are you here alone? Stocked up the groceries?” The shorter one asked him curiously with a smile.

“Uh, yes, Phi,” He smiled back politely.

“Ah, I only here to accompany my friend here who sometimes clueless on what to buy for daily groceries...” The shorter one of them all pointed his thumb to his friend.

“Ai’Mild...,” His taller friend sighed.

“Am I wrong, though?” He retorted to his friend, and turned back to Gulf. “Ah, anyway, this is my co-workers from the office, P’Mew, P’Mew, this is my neighbor from the apartment, N’Gulf.”

Gulf just smile politely and nodded his head before the older one offered his hand to be shaken. “Ah, I’m a bit in a hurry, please, excuse me, Phi,” He turned back to quickly walked back into the cashier.

“Why does this kid so in hurry today....,” Mild appeared to be confused, because usually, his neighbour would converse with him for at least 15 minutes. There was even a moment when he forgot to took his laundry because Mild keep chirping about how cute his nephew was when he visited them during holidays.

“So, that was your neighbour, Ai’Mild?” His taller friend asked lightly as he put back the Corn Flakes that he took earlier, and change it into Coco Pops, just because he had feeling that chocolate flavored cereal would be better for his breakfast.

“Hmm,” Mild nodded, still staring at his neighbour who already paid for his groceries. “I guess he’s busy with work or something, he usually always love to talk to me.”

Mew just nodded, put his cereal box at his basket and tied up his hair that starting to grew even longer while watching the younger chocolatier walking out of the supermarket.

“Oh my God, I forgot to tell Khun Boss that we want to close the store today for testing the new menu for year-end special,” The ever so calm and proper Tong unusually gasped when he just finished taking out the fresh ingredients from the fridge.

“Just call him, Phi? It’s still 30 minutes before our opening time, anyway, I bet no one would come this early to our shop,” Gulf looked up at the clock.

“Yeah, right, he must be mad at us because we told us this sudden, still.... but we couldn’t move back the food testing day even further....” The older one tsked.

“Do you want me to talk to him?” Gulf offered to the older pâtissier.

“Nah, I will call him, it’s my own duty, anyway. Just help me to put the announcement at the chalkboard and put it outside the store, Gulf, so that no one would come to our store. I will ask P’Am to announce it on our social media account, too,” Tong said hurriedly as he took his phone and call the owner and the marketing manager immediately.

The younger one nodded and he took out the chalkboard and wrote that they will be close as for today and will open again in usual business hours tomorrow. When he want to put the chalkboard and the display standing outside, he startled when a familiar figure already went out from his car and walk to his way. The young chocolatier quicken his way to put the standing display and the chalkboard properly so that he could avoid him, but of course with his enormous luck, the said person already standing in front of the chalkboard.

“So... you guys will be closing today...?” He tilted his head, reading the announcement from the chalkboard closely.

“Uh, yes, sorry, Phi. We will be open as usual by tomorrow,” Gulf trying to nodded politely.

Right at this moment, the head pâtissier appeared at the entrance door. “Gulf, why are you taking so long? Please help me—,” Tong startled and nodded politely when he realized that one of their regulars, the one that always coming to their store almost everyday currently talk to his junior staff, “Excuse me, Phi, sorry to disturb you.” He wai politely to the customer.

“Oh, it’s okay, I just didn’t know that you guys will be close today," The taller one smiled to him.

“Uh, yes, apparently we have to close the café today because we have to testing new menus for Christmas and New Year specials,” He explained briefly to the taller one.

“Ah.... can I join?” He asked curiously while smiling.

The two pastry chefs just look at their regulars confusedly.

“You know... I come here almost everyday... so I guess you will need my opinion when it comes to new menu...” Their customer tried to explained to them. “I know that I’m not a professional food critiques, but I love desserts and sweets so much that I eat it on daily basis. I guess I will know if a dessert taste bad...?” He tried again before he added, _“That_ , if you guys would need me. But, anyway, I guess I will just disturb you guys, now, if you excuse me...” He nodded politely at both of them before turned away and walking back to the parking lot.

“Excuse me, wait, Phi!” Tong suddenly called for the tall customer.

“Maybe, we could have some of your help...” He smiled sheepishly, which got Gulf turned to him with rage and mouthed to the older pâtissier, _“Phi, what the hell?!”_

Which lead him into the present time where he silently — and grudgingly, deep inside his heart — began melting the chocolate in double boiler. He already had the idea to exploring local artisan chocolate instead of the french chocolate Valrhona or belgian Callebout for the special menu because he deemed that the local artisan chocolate could beat the imported one in terms of quality these days. Well, it would be the marketing team’s job to make the customer believe on that theory as well, so he would just let them do the job and trying to create the best dish that he could made.

Now that the madeleine and financier would be on trend again ever since the trend come from Korea in the middle of the year, he already discussed with P’Tong that they could explore the idea to create various fillings and dippings for the french cake, like white chocolate, milk chocolate, raspberry jam, custard, and caramel to name a few aside for the twist for their regular menu. He also wanted to explore with good old chocolate devil’s cake with a twist as he exploring with liquor syrup and tropical artisan chocolate, and of course he couldn’t left out a special truffle flavours. Maybe, gingerbread or peppermint flavours, but, yeah, he decided to make some more flavours in mind so that their boss could decide better based on a wider options.

After he shifted the flours, cocoa powder, and baking powder alongside with espresso powder to enhance the flavour of chocolate, he startled when the uninvited customer that apparently sitting on the high chair near the display corner that usually only reserved for people that waiting for their takeaway orders rapped his fingers at the wooden table. Gulf side eyeing him annoyedly and focusing back on the chocolate cake that he was currently making.

Noticing the tense, Tong decided to talk to the customer while he folding the pancake soufflé batter to the whipped egg whites from the other side of the open kitchen, “We're noticing that you’re coming here often, Phi, do you actually like sweets so much?”

“Uh, yeah, actually, I really like dessert, and I just have to eat sweet food for breakfast,” The tall customer replied as he smiled to the pâtissier.

“Ah, I see, that explained why you often come here during morning time... Well, not every guy would like sweets like you, though. Even for me and Gulf here, even if we’re basically working with cakes, pastries, and chocolate for years now... We’re not exactly crazy about dessert. I’m just okay, though. Like, I could finished a sliced of cake if I had to, but Gulf here... there was a time where he despise sweets when we’re still at culinary school. But now, he’s just doing it for the sake of work, basically,” Tong shrugged as he put the thick batter on the heated pan and let it sit before he flipped to the other side.

“Really? How could you guys work here if you don’t like sweets, though?” The handsome customer asked curiously.

“Well... we’re the biggest critiques of our own creations, I guess.... If we could pleased the tastebuds of picky eaters like both of us, then most likely the customers would like it as well,” He put the already done Japanese styled soufflé pancake to the plate and served it with whipped cream, crumbled nuts, gingerbread sauce, and dark chocolate sauce that Gulf already prepared before.

“Here’s the first menu, Phi,” Tong served the plate to the lighter skinned customer. “Since we sell a lot of Japanese soufflé pancake for the past year... we figure that we want to create the christmas version of it, with gingerbread flavour. We will be having the apple pie flavour as well, which I will be making in a sec...” He put the other pancake and put caramelized apple and crumbled pie tart on top of it after he scooped vanilla ice cream and serve it with caramel sauce.

“Please, tell me which one do you like the most... or perhaps we could have both of them on our menu...,” Tong raised his eyebrows nervously as he put the other plate in front of the customer and wait for him to try.

Mew nodded and took his knife and fork to try both of the pancakes. He was already a fan of their soufflé pancake to begin with, so these flavors would only enhance the deliciousness of the pancake even more, “I like both of them. But if I had to choose... I would probably prefer the gingerbread one.”

“Really? Why?” The pâtissier asked him curiously for his opinion.

“It’s just my preference, I prefer berries over apples on my dessert, I guess... But that doesn’t make it any less good, though.”

Tong pondered a bit before he called for the chocolatier that currently busy putting his chocolate cake batter to the oven, “Gulf come here for a second.”

“Yeah, Phi?”

“Please try those pancakes, a bit,” Tong asked him, which only made him confused because as much as a food testing day would involved on trying and sharing menus from the same plate — they currently involved with one of their regulars here, and it would be impolite to do that. However, the said customer smile to him and offered the plate, which only ended up made him flustered and reach for a clean fork in a hurry to try both menus with a quite, “Excuse, me.” While completely ignoring the fact that the customer been watching him closely.

Gulf blinked his eyes and pondered a bit as he compared both flavours. Since his sugar tolerance was pretty low, of course he would opted out for the tangier dish, “I prefer the apple pie one, Phi, but I guess you should try it by yourself.”

“I’ve tried it last night during my spare time.... but I guess we should just keep both of them so that customer could make their own choice...”

Suddenly, the door creaked, and the café owner come up, a bit grumbling because his business partner and staff gave a short notice for the food testing today, “Why on earth you just called me this morning, Tong....”

“Sorry, Khun Boss, it’s been a hectic week, therefore, we completely forget to tell you earlier...,” He snickered. Even if they were business partners, co-owners of the patisserie café, and same age friend, Tong always insisted to call Boss politely during work hours for the sake of professionalism.

“P’Mew?” The owner of the café startled when he realized that there was someone familiar and also most definitely not a part of their establishment.

“Boss? I didn’t know that you work here?” Their regulars also seemed surprised by this fact.

“Ah... yes, it’s actually one of the franchise that I owned...” He wai the older one as he took a seat beside him. “Well, in this particular branch, I worked together with my high school friend, Tong, that worked here as the head pâtissier as well as mastermind of all of the menu here...”

“Oh, so you guys...?” Tong asked them curiously.

“Yeah, I knew P’Mew from my college, he was my TA when I took master studies," Boss explained to his business partner.

As all of them converse on how Mew was actually the regular of this café, Gulf just sighed deep inside his heart, he just didn't want to count just how much he could be connected with this particular guy. He decided just to continue his work as the oven giving a sign that his cake was done baking. He let out the cake to the cooling racks and checking out if the second layer of truffles that he made earlier already set in the fridge or not.

“Only the pancake were done?” Boss asked them after testing both of the flavours that he ended up approved to be included in the menu. “N’Gulf? You haven’t finished something?”

“Please, wait P’Boss... the truffles will be done in 15 minutes,” Gulf calmly let out the chocolate truffles from the molds and roll it into cocoa powder, nuts, crumbled speculoos cookies and splattered the others with melted white chocolate. He then put it tidily in the white ceramic plate and served it in front of P’Boss and the customer. “Well, here are the special flavours chocolate truffles — dark chocolate raspberry truffles, white chocolate gingerbread truffles, peppermint mocha kahlua truffles, panettone truffles, and baileys almond truffles.”

As he watched both of them took a bite for every truffles, he continue, “This time around, I used award winning and locally sourced Thai cocoa beans, mainly from Mae Taeng, Chanthaburi, Prachuap Khiri Khan, and Chumphon. Even if right now people didn’t realized that our locally sourced chocolate is good as well, I would say that even if it’s not the best one, you would have so many journey in one bite. At the beginning you can smell honey, and at the end you may get the aroma of dried fruits. The complexity of the chocolate is very interesting, which is why I want to highlight it for our special menu.”

“Interesting,” P’Boss nodded as he took the truffles bite by bite slowly. The person beside him also nodded while he took his raspberry truffles.

“Also, since it’s already the season for Korean strawberry...,” He served another plate that he already prepared before. “I got inspired by Godiva’s chocolate dipped strawberries, to make our version, hopefully a better one, with the locally sourced chocolate as well as Korean strawberry. I specifically used Korean strawberry, because it’s definitely sweeter and juicier rather than other kind of strawberries.”

“Ah, strawberries! My favorite!” The handsome customer — _no_ , the customer said that excitedly, which just made Gulf a bit annoyed. _Why didn’t he served another fruit?_ Why it had to be strawberry to begin with? He only could sighed as he watching the said customer biting the strawberry as if it was the most delicious dish ever — he may or may not watch the strawberry’s juice dripping a bit to the customer’s chin that goes by the name Mew Suppasit (not that he really care about that) — before he swiped it with a tissue and turned to Gulf and smile sheepishly, told him that it taste really good and probably one of his favorites amongst the menu that he already tried, which only irked the chocolatier even more. _How could such a simple dish beat out a well crafted pastries and cakes???_

He only rolled his eyes as he and P’Tong continue to served more dish for the food testing day. After a hectic day, and a lot of discussions, they finally decided to settled with 15 special menus for the end of the year, which mainly focused on special flavours for the celebration of christmas and new year. The customer asked permission to leave earlier sometime around the afternoon — again, not that Gulf put so much attention towards it — and right after the chefs and the intern busy cleaning up the back kitchen and the kitchen counter, Tong of course just had to spilled some things to his business partner.

“You see, Boss,” He glanced to the younger one briefly before turning back to his friend. “N’Gulf right here apparently have some sort weird tension with your acquaintance earlier, P’Mew.”

“Really?” Boss snorted as he busy reviewing the sales report for the week. “Well, go for it, N’Gulf, I think P’Mew is single?”

“P’Boss.... Do you actually believe what P’Tong said earlier?” The younger chocolatier rolled his eyes.

“Well, why not? He’s handsome, smart, good at his job, literally everyone in my class back then lining up for him,” The owner of the café chuckled.

“Not entirely surprised by that fact, almost every girls that comes to our café literally comes because he was here,” Gulf sighed heavily.

“What will you do, Nong, you have so much competition around you,” Tong snorted as he folded his dirty apron.

“I don’t know if you’re his type, but I think he likes someone cute?” The café owner mindlessly replied.

“Gulf is cute, if he wanted it to be,” Tong nodded, amused by his flustered junior. “Although he preferred to appeared cold and harsh most of the time, especially to someone’s new.”

 _“P’Tong—"_ Gulf rolled his eyes again as he checked the kitchen counter for the last time before he let out his backpack from the staff’s locker, “I’m not interested in him. I’ve told you that I annoyed by him, right?”

“N’Gulf, we have to respect our customer all the same...” Boss turned to the younger one to scold him.

“But, P’Boss...,” Gulf huffed childishly.

“Just learn to know him better? There’s a reason why all of that girls always lining up for him, right?”

“Why should I? He’s just a mere customer,” The younger one frowned stubbornly.

“Customer _is_ King, N’Gulf....,” Boss reminded him.

Gulf just tsked and went to the backroom to changed his uniform to his casual clothing.

“See, Boss?” Tong snorted looking at the younger one’s antics, “That’s how stubborn our talented chocolatier here.”

“Why did you annoyed by him so much, anyway, Gulf? I even confused by that fact...,” Boss said calmly as he checked if the cashier were locked for the last time. “If you said that it was his appearance that makes the girls coming here, then, it’s good for our sales.”

“I know right? That’s what I said to him. I can’t believe with this kid,” Tong eyeing him while shaking his head when the younger one coming back with his black pullover and jeans.

“I’m just saying that it would be better if the customers are genuinely interested on our food rather than making up some weird excuses to eat here just to see some guy, like, it doesn’t make sense?”

“Sales still means sales, Nong,” Boss shrugged lightly. “That was the reason why those other cafés and companies hire celebrities to promote their place. They come for the celebrities, not so much for the food.”

“Although, we have to make sure that our food taste exceptional regardless of what was the reason those people come to us,” Tong smiled at the younger one who still behaving like a child. “Well, anyway, thank you for your hard work today, guys, see you tomorrow, okay?" He said goodbye to all the staffs and interns, "Take care."

Gulf stomped heavily when he was walking back to his condo, still feeling slightly annoyed because he was getting scolded by his senior at the workplace. His condo was a 15 minutes drive from his workplace, and he agreed immediately when P’Boss offered to him if he want to dropped him off along the way. He stretched his arms over his head tiredly, because it has been such a rough week and he couldn’t wait until he reached his bed. It was still 2 days before his day off so he would just coping up with it by sleeping or playing games with his friends. After he arrived at his floor, he mindlessly searching for his key before he unlocked the door, and when he turned around, he just realized that he unconsciously locking eyes with a familiar figure.

_Oh, God, no, not again._

He initially just wanted to close his door immediately, acting as if he didn’t see anything, but he just reminded of what P’Boss were saying, that customer is actually a king. He just sighed heavily and decided to be a good human being as for now and went back outside to greet the familiar person who never stopped appearing on his life for the past few days.

“Uh, Phi... do you wait for P’Mild?” He tried to asked politely. 

“Yeah,” He nodded. “I’ve been calling his phone but he didn’t pick up for the past hour, but we already agreed to meet at his place. I guess he haven’t come back yet...”

“Oh... you already wait here for an hour, Phi?” The slightly tanned boy started to feel guilty when he heard about this.

"Yeah, but it’s okay," He waived him off. "Mild will be coming here shortly, I guess. Maybe he still busy driving, and couldn’t picked up the call or something."

Gulf bite his lip hesitantly, and pondered if he would ended up regretting the decision that he decided to take. But, the older one already waited outside for an hour and his apartment building was not exactly the most lush one, and it certainly wouldn’t be comfortable to be wait outside.... And he didn’t know when will his neighbour finally coming home....

_Oh,_ to be a proper human being or not....

Gulf finally took a deep sigh. He will regret it later, but, still....

“P’Mew, do you want to wait for P’Mild at my place?”


	2. When everything shifted a bit

How do you expect an apartment where a pastry chef lives looked like? Well, since Mew already visited his friend’s apartment before, of course it wouldn't be entirely different since the apartment complex already had their own design template to begin with. However, since he never had a chef as a friend before, sometimes he imagined that a chef’s kitchen and refrigerator would be filled with all of the complete spices, fresh vegetables and meat ready to be cooked, or maybe in this case, it would be filled with any kind of flours, a variety of cocoa powders, arrays and arrays of chocolates... while in fact it wasn’t really different to normal kitchen. In fact, it was pretty empty, maybe only filled with the normal necessities like salt, pepper, sugar, and tea.

“I'm sorry to make you wait, Phi, anyway, do you want to drink something?” The owner of the condo come out from his bedroom with a more comfortable clothing after he dropped his things and washed his face briefly. Clearly, he wasn't someone that actually took a great amount of time to take care of his looks. “Do you want coffee, tea, or water?”

“Tea would be nice, thank you,” He smiled politely as the younger chocolatier nodded understandingly and started to reach for the kettle and filled it with water and put it on top of the stove. As he waited for the water to be boiled, he reached for the nearest tea even if he had several selection of teas without even asking the older one which one he would like — not that Mew mind though — and asked him while he put the tea bag on a white mug with painted navy checkered pattern, “I thought you both worked together with P’Mild, Phi? Why didn’t you went out from the office together?”

“Well, since both of us are teachers in the university, more often than not we have different schedules, since we teach different subjects,” The older one explained briefly, which replied by a slight nodded by the younger one.

When Mew wanted to asked further, the water was boiling and he brew the tea right away, and mixed it with a lukewarm water a little bit so that the tea wouldn’t be pipping hot (how considerate of him, Mew mused silently), and gave it to the older teacher, “I always got weird selection of teas from P’Boss whenever he traveled as a souvenir, so I hope you wouldn’t mind if the tea would be a little bit unique flavoured.”

“Really? What is it?” The older one asked curiously, since Mew always up to try unique and trending flavours in anything.

“I don’t really understand either, but I guess it’s a dried blueberry and honey infused black tea....,” He read the colourful box briefly. “Something that he bought from Beijing, I guess.”

The older one nodded while sipped the tea slowly. It surprised him that the blueberry flavour was unlike the blueberry that he usually tasted, it was more on the acidic and fruity side, while still had that distinct berry flavour, but the acidity was balanced by the infused honey black tea, which make it still comforting albeit a bit unique in flavour.

“Is it weird? Do you want sugar, Phi? I haven’t added any of it to your cup,” The younger one asked him while he took a seat at one of the seat near the kitchen counter.

“No, no, no, it’s okay, I don’t really like sugar in my tea,” Mew replied to him kindly. “Why don’t you make one for yourself?”

“I’m afraid that I couldn’t get asleep if I drink tea this late... my caffeine tolerance was pretty low...,” He plopped his arms on the kitchen counter.

As Mew sipping his tea slowly at the couch in the small living room across the open kitchen, he watched the young chocolatier starting to get sleepy whilst he rest his head on top of his palm. It amused him, this younger boy. Mew wasn’t stupid, he knew that Gulf didn’t really like him. In fact, it amused him to see how the younger one would avoided him with all of his might. It amused him even more to see how the universe seems like wanted to see them bumped into each other repeatedly, from the fact that Mild was his neighbour, to the fact that Boss was literally his boss at his workplace. And even with those facts, the younger one always showing his dislike towards him, with his glares and avoidance, though he was trying hard to appear polite in front of him. Therefore it surprised him that he would offered Mew to wait for Mild at his place. Well, Mew never knew why the younger one dislike him, but he deemed that deep inside, he was just a normal good kid. Mew was a freaking teacher for several years already, anyway, and he already met any kind of students with unimaginable attitude, he used to be given any kind of treatment towards him.

Therefore when he met Gulf, he only found his attitude to be cute. No matter he tried to appear like a harsh man, with his glare and all, it only intrigued the older one to found out why he didn’t like Mew that much. Though he never expected that they would be able to make a civilized conversation like this, _this_ soon. He was probably trying hard to be polite to him because he was the regular at the place where worked at and a good friend of Mild.

Or maybe he just tired, Mew thinks, as he was watching the younger one slowly drifted off to slumber — how could someone sleep while he seating uncomfortably, anyway? — he wondered why would he put his guard down in front of a stranger like Mew. What if he was a thief or something?

The tall teacher startled a bit when his phone vibrated.

 **Mild:** P’Mew, I’m sorry I was driving earlier.  
**Mild:** I’m already at my condo.  
**Mild:** Where are you?

He slowly raised from his seat, but even if he didn’t want to wake up the younger one from his slumber, he couldn’t left unannounced as it would be impolite. He knocked the kitchen counter a bit to wake him.

“Nong? Nong?” He knocked again, “Nong Gulf?”

The younger one only scrunches his nose cutely and grumbled softly. “I’m leaving okay? Mild already here. I—,” The younger chocolatier lazily opened his doe eyes and staring at his eyes with his clear brown orbs, as if trying to comprehend what was currently happening slowly. Mew just gulped and leaned back in instinct, “I— why don’t you move to your room? It must be uncomfortable to sleep here.”

The younger one just nodded softly, his fluffy hair was bouncing cutely, and Mew was trying hard not to reached and ruffled through his soft hair. Mew sighed, he must be really tired to suddenly sleep like that, in front of stranger like him, nonetheless. He softly asked the younger one to move to his room again, and he finally slowly stand up and dragged his feet to his room. Mew was afraid that he would stumble into something, but he didn’t want to intrude his privacy by helping him to reach his bed, though he really wanted to make sure that the younger one already tucked safely on his bed. Since he couldn’t do any of that, he just watched from a far to make sure until Gulf reached his room without stumbling into anything, and make sure that the door already automatically locked from inside as he left to Mild’s room.

“Where were you earlier, P’Mew? I thought you texted me that you already here?” The shorter teacher asked him the first thing right after he opened the door.

“Well.... uh....” Mew hummed, confused how to explained it to Mild while he eyeing him weirdly with suspicion. _“What???”_ He instead defending himself.

“Why are you being hesitant like that? That’s so unlike you? Did you do anything weird?”

“No!!! Why would I do anything weird?” He defended himself again.

“I don’t know? Why else would you being like this, anyway?” The shorter teacher keep peering suspiciously at him but decided to dropped it. “Anyway, here’s the document that you asked earlier... Do you want to drink something, Phi?”

“No, no, you don’t have to make any drink, I already drank tea earlier,” He shrugged while took a seat at the couch.

“Tea? I don’t think that there’s any café or takeaway places that serves tea that still open this late?”

 _“Uh—,”_ Mew sometimes hate why his friend were this observant.

“What are you hiding, Phi?” The owner of the condo plopped down at another couch, back to peering into his workmate.

“Nothing, it’s just that your neighbour earlier asked me to wait at his place.”

“My neighbour?” Mild frowned confusedly. “The mother with twin children that live on my left side?”

“No, the other one," Mew replied vaguely.

“N’Gulf? Why would he offered you to wait at his place?” Mild folded both his arms and tilted his head confusedly.

“I don’t know either," The older one shrugged lightly.

“If it’s just him why did you acted weirdly like that earlier? Do you like him or something?” He frowned at his friend, he remembered that it was not the first time that the older one would falling in love at a first sight, the sappy man that he was, really.

“We’re practically strangers???” He defended himself again, this time with a raised voice.

“Why are you keep trying to defending yourself like this anyway, Phi? It makes you even more suspicious, you know.”

“Why are you interrogating me like that, anyway?” Mew retorted back.

“I don’t know... it’s just odd, you’re acting like this...” Mild raised his eyebrows and shrugged. “Anyway, I knew that he’s your type, he’s cute and all that, but I don’t think that he liked man?”

“So, he currently has girlfriend?” 

“I knew it! So you’re indeed like him,” Mild snapped his fingers so loudly it made the older one irked because he was being tricked. “Why are you avoiding my questions, anyway, you could’ve asked my help you know, if you want to get closer with him.”

Mew pondered a bit, because he didn’t think that he liked the younger one that way. Interested, maybe yes, because Gulf was indeed, attractive, but he mainly being interested because he was curious why the chocolatier dislike him so much. He didn’t realized that he voiced all of that out loud so that his friend just shook his head and looked at him sadly, “Aow, our poor and pathetic Prince Suppasit, the one that always being followed by everyone because he was so handsome and perfect like that, never get used to being rejected.”

“Ai’Mild—,” Mew rolled his eyes heavily.

“Did you already met him before our encounter at the supermarket?” The shorter one searched into the older teacher’s face, and raised his eyebrows again with knowing face. “You _did_ , did you? I bet you frequently come to the café where he worked at or something?”

“Well, he just happened to work at the café that served the best dessert according to me,” He shrugged lightly.

“Really? But do you really have to come there, like, every single day? It’s the café that you often came for breakfast, isn’t it?” He keep staring at Mew skeptically. “You do know that it has closer branch near your place, right?”

“But, it’s closer to the campus,” Mew retorted back.

Mild just raised his eyebrows again, clearly didn’t buy that excuse, “Anyway, Phi, since you like this café so much, why don’t you make it as the venue for the Twice anniversary cup sleeve event that would be held in two weeks? You haven’t booked the venue yet, right?”

“Wait— what are you saying again, Ai’Mild?” The older one asked confusedly.

“Why?” The younger one snorted with amused glances towards him, “Are you scared to be judged for being a hardcore Kpop fans by your Nong?”

“I’m not—“ Mew ready to defended himself again, but get cut by the younger one.

“Aow, the Mew Suppasit that never scared to be judged by anyone, not even the prettiest star of the campus nor his students.....” Mild continue to shake his head in amusement. “Who knows it would take this cute tall boy to get him all flustered like this....”

“Ai’Mild—,” Mew sighed heavily.

“Really, Phi, it’s just amusing to see you like this, I don’t think I ever see you like this before? Even with your ex, you always being calm and composed like usual?” Mild snickered annoyingly. “So what about your fanboy side? You’re never ashamed of it to begin with, you’re one of the admin of the biggest Twice fanaccount in Thailand, anyway. I mean sooner or later, he bound to know about this fact once you will be in relationship with him. What’s the use of hiding this fact, anyway?”

“It wasn’t like that, really....” Mew insisted, while the shorter just rolled his eyes tiredly.

“Okay, so, it’s all set, right? We should go to the café tomorrow before work to book the place for the cup sleeve event, okay?” The younger one clapped excitedly.

“Good morning, could we ask the regulation and minimum pax and orders if we want to held an event here?” Mild blinking sweetly to the head pastry chef that Mew knew always working together with Gulf. He haven’t see the younger one yet, though — _not_ that he really mind about that.

“Hello,” The pastry chef that Mew remembered goes by the name Tong smile kindly. “Thank you for considering our place to be your event’s venue... So, here’s the minimum orders and menu....” He took out the restaurant menu and the leaflet filled with set menu that could be ordered specifically for events as he explained the regulation in great detail.

“Ah... I see... Actually, we’re going to need a space to set a small gallery event to display several pictures here later, is it okay?” Mild asked further, and the head chef and co-owner explained that they should book the entire café if they wanted to do that since there’s a possibility where the event could disturbed other customer, and they decided to booked the café and make the down payment since it still suitable with their budget.

“Where is N’Gulf, Phi?” Mild asked curiously as he paid and signed the invoice.

“Oh, he would be coming later, since today is his afternoon shift,” Tong replied kindly as he typed into the cashier machine.

“Oh... I see,” Mild nodded while took a side glance at his friend who didn’t realized that he being watched at. “Would he be on shift on the date that we booked?”

“Wait, let me check for a second...,” The handsome pastry chef checking into the iPad near the cashier machine that filled with booking arrangement and the staff’s schedule. “I’m sorry, coincidentally, it’s his day off... What’s wrong, anyway? Do you know N’Gulf?” He smiled politely while also took a glance at the taller teacher weirdly, as if he knew something that Mew never know before.

“He’s actually my neighbour at the condo, it’s just sad, I thought I could meet him either today or at the event...” Mild pouting sadly, which his friend totally knew that it was staged.

“Ah, I see... I will send your messages when he arrived here later,” He gave a customary smile again and said thank you before the two professors walking out of the café.

Mew honestly didn’t know wether he would feel relieved or sad with the fact that the younger chocolatier wasn’t here to see his weird side. Well, he never ashamed of his geek or fanboy side to begin with, though, it was just....

“You’re disappointed aren’t you, Phi?” Mild was looking at him knowingly.

“What are you talking about?” He frowned while looked at his friend.

The younger teacher just clicked his tongue in annoyance because the older one still being in denial state.

“N’Gulf! Where are you all these time? I haven’t see you all week!!” The young teacher hugged his neighbour and tapped his shoulder in affection when they bumped into each other on laundry room.

“Uh, hi, Phi?” Gulf asked him confusedly.

“I came to the café where you worked at several days ago, you know, but you’re not there?” Mild explained to him.

“Ahhh, yes, P’Tong told me... I was confused when he said that, but it turned out that it’s you, Phi...” Gulf nodded while he put his white clothes in one of the washing machines and put the coloured one in different machine to save time. “What are you doing at the dessert café, anyway, Phi?”

“I booked the café for an event with P’Mew, but your co-worker also told us that the D-Day of the event would also be your day off.... How unfortunate....” He pouted sadly while took a seat at the bench that was provided to wait their laundry to be finished.

“Ah.... I’m sorry, Phi, it’s the manager that decided and set our schedule, so we couldn’t really change it to the way we liked it to be,” He smiled sadly as he put the powder detergent on both washing machines and press start button.

“Anyway,” Mild started again while the younger one took a seat beside him. “I heard that you let P’Mew wait at your place several days ago?”

The teacher would never expect that the younger one would suddenly looked a bit surprised and reddened up to his ears as if Mild caught him doing something that he didn’t supposed to. He then coughed lightly, and calmly said, “Uh, it’s just... he said that he already waited for you for an hour... it must be not comfortable for him to wait for you while standing up like that, so...” He smiled sheepishly.

“He could’ve just wait in the lobby downstairs, you know....”

“Ah...,” He startled and Mild was trying hard not to smile amusedly at him while the younger one’s ears started to reddened even more, “I forgot about the waiting area in the lobby.....”

“Thank you for taking care of my friend, anyway, Nong,” Mild instead nodded understandingly, being the good neighbour that he was like the usual in front of the younger one. “But I never knew that you both know each other before?” He asked innocently.

“It’s just that... he’s a regular in our place, Phi,” He tried to explained to the older one, waiving his hands at nothing.

Mild hummed, still staying there even if the washing machine that he used already giving signal that his laundry was already done.

“If you know him before why you didn’t recognize him when we met at the supermarket, Nong?” He keep peering into the chocolatier.

“Well... we never talked before? So I just nodded politely back then....,” Gulf answered truthfully, though he left out the details that he actually really wanted to avoided Mew at that particular time. He glad that it seems that the older one bought it, and Mild raised himself up to take his fresh laundry out to his laundry basket and suddenly stopped before he went out from the laundry room.

“N’Gulf, I don’t really know what was currently happening to both of you guys... But what if I say that you’re exactly his type?” He smirked when he saw the younger one went flabbergasted and his ears started to reddened again. “Well, anyway, nice to meet you today, Nong, I will leave first, okay?” He went back into his good neighbour mode and smile so sweetly before he went out to his room, leaving the younger one confused as hell.

Honestly, this weird tense between Gulf and the older teacher that seemed to like dessert so much left the younger one even more confused by each day. Why everyone keep assuming that he romantically interested in the older one, anyway? How could someone assuming either hatred or a small kindness into some form of love? His bosses said that it was wrong for him to hate your customer, well, okay, so he decided to be a better human being and actually acting like a grown up. However, his neighbor also assuming that something was going on just because he let his friend to wait at his place. Why everything that he did always seen as something weird to anyone? He sighed as the washing machines were signaling that he could insert the softener, then he raised himself from the bench to pour the liquid softener to both of the washing machines.

Well, he just deemed that the older one ain’t that bad when they had a short talk at his place. His mind went a bit blurred that night because he was tired and sleepy as hell, but he thought, since everything still in tact at his apartment by the time he woke up, and not a single thing lost from his place, he then decided that what was P’Tong and P’Boss said was right. He had no reason to put so much hatred to the older one. Therefore, he acted more polite to P’Mew when he saw him during his shift. It wasn’t something special, though, it was just something that he would do whenever he greeted a customer normally. Why would he put such a bad light to the older one when his bosses actually grateful that the sales spiked up because of him, right? He could work in the desserts and pastries industry even if he never liked sweets all that much, therefore he could live with the fact that he had to stopped hating the customer that actually never did anything harmful to him, right?

“Gulf, you’re stress baking,” The co-owner of the pastry café looking at him with concern.

“Huh, I’m sorry, what, Phi?” The young chocolatier halted his movement right after he took out the piping hot brownies and placed it at the stainless table.

“You keep baking unnecessary things that are not in our menu,” He leaned his back at the kitchen counter, still looking at the the younger one that acted weirdly.

“I’m just experimenting with new menu. It was a huge trend lately, the 48 hours soft baked cookies, the 100 hours brownies... I’m just curious, we might put it on our menu next month, Phi, if it’s actually good, even if it took so much work,” The younger one tried to explained while he wrapped the hot brownie with aluminum foil and put it into the freezer carefully.

“But it wasn’t really necessary? We should just focusing on the new christmas and year end special menu that would be released within the next few days?”

“I’m sorry, Phi— if you think that I wasted the ingredients... you could cut the expenses from my pay check...,” He said regretfully.

“No, no, it’s not like that... I’m just asking what’s wrong, Nong? It’s not like you? Do you have problems with your family or what?” The head pastry chef asked in worry.

“Huh? Nothing’s wrong, Phi?” The younger one blinked confusedly. 

“But, you’re stress baking. I knew that it’s one of your bad habit when you were unconsciously stressed out," The pâttissier insisted.

“But I’m not?” He frowned and tilted his head. 

Suddenly, one of their regular stopped into the kitchen counter to put his dirty plate and cup and said thank you, which greeted politely by both of the staffs before he finally went outside. As the pastry chef gave the dirty plate to the intern at the back kitchen, he folded his arm, watching the tall customer’s way that started to walk farther and farther from their place, and looked back at his Nong. He also noticed that his junior already become more civilized with the customer that he used to hate so much. “Gulf, do you really have to hate someone in order behave like your usual self?” He frowned at the younger one’s oddness.

“What are you talking about, Phi?” The younger one blinked confusedly again before he turned back to splattered melted chocolate to the raspberry flavored macarons.

When the event finally started several days later, all of the team from the Twice Thailand fansite forum helped to put the pictures of the members in the wall neatly, put the life sized cardboards of each members, and decorated it. When Mew watched his team closely and reached for the cup sleeve that already arrived, freshly printed and cut from the print shop, he then walked into the cashier, wanted to instructed to the café’s staff to put the guest’s drink with the event cup sleeve every time they exchange their paid tickets that already included with one drink of their choice and a plate of dessert. He startled a bit because he never expected that the one that would standing in the cashier was actually the young chocolatier that he thought was taking his day off today.

“Uh....” Mew hesitated a bit.

“Yeah, Phi? Can I help you?” The younger one smiled politely.

“Uh... I just want to give this...,” He hand out the colorful cup sleeve that filled with faces of members of the group. “Later, the guest that would come will exchange the tickets for the menu, right? I just want to ask for your help to put this cup sleeve on their ordered beverages later....”

“Ah, okay, Phi,” He nodded understandingly, slightly inspecting the cup sleeve before put it near the plastic cups for takeaway beverages.

“I thought you won’t be coming today?” 

“One of the staff is sick, Phi, so I filled for him,” He smiled politely again.

Mew hummed and nodded to the younger one, “Thank you for your help, I will get back to decorate for the event.”

“You’re welcome, Phi.”

In all honesty, Mew didn’t know if he would be grateful or not with the turned out of the events. The thing is, he was totally confused with the fact that the younger one didn’t avoid him any longer, and actually behave politely towards him. It wasn’t that he didn’t like to be treated politely... it was just... it left a bad taste in his mouth, the fact that he was treated like other customer, like other people. He sighed silently as he walking towards Mild’s way and helping him setting up the table neatly with other staff that was also one of his student at the university.

“Kru Mew,” She asked him in a low voice. “Don’t you think the guy in the cashier is cute?”

Mild raised his head and trying to held his snort when he realized that the one that standing in front of the cashier was actually his neighbor, “Nong, focus on your job!” He snapped into the student.

“Aow, Kru Mild, couldn’t I see such an eye candy? We're not in a class, anyway, why couldn’t I?!” The young student pouted sadly, which just made Mild took a side glance at the other teacher, clearly amused when he saw him slightly annoyed by how the young girl acted and left immediately to check the other side of the café.

It was one hour before the event started, and the young chocolatier giving out brownies and cookies to everyone within the team. “I don’t think that you guys already have breakfast before? Please take our baking samples and let me know your thoughts,” Gulf was smiling cutely to Mild and the student — not that Mew watching with envy or something like that from the other side of the café — and then he walked to every nooks and corners of the café, giving out samples to everyone. When it was finally Mew’s turn, the older one gulped a bit when the chocolatier offered him the plates of cookies and brownies to be taken with a smile.

“Actually, I’ve been developing these recipes and new baking methods for quite a while, Phi... since you’re our regular and you already went to our food testing day once... I hope that you could give me some input with them," He gave Mew a customary smile.

Mew nodded while he took a bite of the surprisingly complex depths flavour of chocolate — unlike the brownies that he already tasted before, and then he looked up at the chef confusedly, which only got an expecting expression from the younger one, “What do you think, Phi?”

“It’s good, but.... it’s way more complex than other brownies.... I think...? Do you use different chocolate from the usual?” Mew tried helplessly. Though he had this perfect persona, he never been a good food critique, and his vocabulary when it comes to food description were never _that_ smart like those food bloggers. However, since he loves sweets so much, he tried hard to describe it, though he didn’t really know what he was actually saying.

“Actually I used aged baking time this time, Phi, to deepened the taste of the chocolate. This brownies was prepared and baked for 100 hours, whereas this cookies for 48 hours. Please help yourself with the soft baked cookies, Phi,” He smiled again, urging the older one to take one.

Mew licked his lips hesitantly before he took one of the cookies and delved into it, “It was definitely better than your usual cookies....” He munched slowly. “It was like... the flavour mixed in a little bit better? I think?”

“I knew that I could trust your opinion, Phi,” The younger one smiling with satisfaction. “Now I just had to insisted to P’Boss and P’Tong to make it as a new menu next month,” He grinned so cutely it actually hurts, and turned back to the older one to said thank you before he went back to the kitchen with probably a small piece of Mew that he took away. 

_Okay,_ Mew think to himself while watching the young chocolatier greeted the head pastry chef that just come to the café with the same smile that he was giving to him earlier. _How to make that smile to be exclusively made for him and himself only?_


	3. I never thought that I’d catch this lovebug again

“N’Gulf, I’m sorry that you have to help us bringing all of these stuffs...” Mild said apologetically after they come back from the café with a lot of cardboard boxes to be put back in Mild’s place.

“It’s okay, Phi. I’m also on my way back home, anyway,” Gulf shrugged easily while he helped Mild, Mew, and their student’s stuffs earlier from the event.

“You must have think that we are weird, aren’t you, Phi?” The girl asked cheekily. “Not everyone get used to cup sleeve events like that.”

“Well... I don’t think that it’s weird... a lot of my friends like kpop as well...” Gulf pondered after he pressed the elevator button. “It’s just that... I’m confused? Why would you make such event when the group that you are celebrating didn’t even come?”

“Well, the idea is to make the group realized that they have fans all over the world.” The girl replied while smiling way too brightly for Gulf’s taste. “Therefore, even if they are in Seoul, they will know that the whole world also celebrating for their anniversary, Phi.”

Gulf hummed, but still confused nonetheless, “Is that so? How would they know?”

“Because we trend it on twitter, and we also have specific hashtags regarding these events,” Mild added. “Well, if the fans lucky, sometimes the celebrities also come to their cup sleeve events.”

“It’s not that we expecting that they would come, anyway, since we’re in different country,” The girl nodded. “But it’s just fun to celebrate this event with fellow fans. And we could make new friends here. Even my friend met her boyfriend through these kind of events.”

The young chocolatier nodded understandingly as the elevator dinged open and he stepped inside. While he waited for the rest of them went inside the elevator, he looked at the tall guy that been silent for the past time and the college girl. _Hmm, is that so?_ No wonder why he didn’t budge a bit when all of those pretty girls coming to the café.

“Anyway, P’Gulf, do you have any girlfriend?”

The slightly tanned boy surprised a bit by the question, “Uh... no, not at this moment, I don’t really have time lately.”

“Really? Why don’t you have one? The café must always filled with pretty girls, right?” The girl keep pushing.

“Nong, _manners_ ,” Mew warned her in cold tone. “You don’t have the right to asked the person that you just knew regarding their private matters.”

“But, Kru Mew...,” She pouted sadly, which happened exactly the same time when the elevator reached Mild and Gulf’s floor.

The other teacher just chuckled upon seeing his student’s antics and opened his condo right away after they reached his place, asked the rest of them to put the boxes in the spare room. Because they already way too tired, they all asked to leave first even when Mild offered them a drink. As Gulf watched the tall teacher and the girl said goodbye to them and left together, Mild laughed lightly, which replied by a confused frown from the latter.

“If you think that they are dating, they are most definitely not, Nong,” His neighbour chuckled amusedly. “Also, P’Mew have this specific rules where he wouldn’t date his own student.”

Gulf didn’t realized that he started to blushed furiously, “I—I’m not—“

“Not that you’re asking, I think I need to reminds you that he’s currently single,” Mild raised his eyebrows playfully, clearly amused by his younger neighbour that reddened up to his ears. “But, anyway, thank you so much, Nong, for today, see you tomorrow okay!” He patted Gulf’s arms playfully before he went back inside his room, leaving the younger one with his own thoughts.

“Thank you very much, the Gingerbread Brownie Cheesecake tasted really good,” Mew said as he placed the empty plate and tea cups on the table corner, knowing that it was made by the younger chocolatier from the last month’s food testing. Turned out, remembering every small details regarding him was definitely rewarding, since it was definitely the first time Mew saw him smiling until his eyes were adorably crinkled. Okay, maybe he started to realized that one the positive side to Gulf’s changing in attitude to him was to see him smiling more often. Well, he also found his grumbling in the past were cute, though.

“Anyway,” Mew started when he make sure that Tong wasn’t in the front counter. “I kind of need to get birthday cake for my mom?”

“Uh, okay? Which one does she likes, Phi?” Gulf asked innocently. “Today, for the whole cake, we have Strawberry Shortcake, Matcha Tiramisu, Bailey’s Chocolate Devil’s Cake....” He pointed into each of the whole cakes in the display, continue to explaining each cakes available to the older one.

“Actually.... I kind of want to ask a favor from you?” Mew tried slowly, which only get a soft frown of confusion from the latter.

“You see,” Mew licked his lips hesitantly. “I want to try baking my mother’s birthday cake for next Monday? Could you please help me on that matter, Gulf?”

“Huh?” The younger one blinked repeatedly, clearly didn’t expect that it would be coming. “Uh, actually, P’Mew, baking cakes isn’t my expertise, P’Tong is the one that bake the best cakes here... my job mainly on making the chocolate treats....” He replied with apologetic smile.

“But, at least you could teach me the basics, right?” Mew tried again, which only made the younger one gulped nervously.

“I— don’t think that they would let us to use the kitchen after working hour here...?”

“We'll be doing it at my place, then,” Mew smiling charmingly over his softy tousled hair. He knew that girls were crazy every time he wear his specs and oversized white shirt that he purposely undone a few buttons so that his prominent collarbones could be shown over a black jeans that still passed for teaching, so he just wore all of that today, just because.

“I, uh—,“ He leaned back a bit because somehow the air suddenly felt suffocating.

“Actually, I already bought all of the baking trays, cake moulds, and all of the ingredients last weekend and I tried baking twice, but I failed miserably,” He pouted sadly. “Could you _please_ help, Nong?”

“P’Mew can I please have your phone?” Tong suddenly appeared out of nowhere when the two of them still tiptoed around each other. The older one got confused, but gave his phone nonetheless, which he immediately typed for something and suddenly Gulf’s phone was ringing from his pocket. “So, that’s N’Gulf’s phone number, you’re welcome,” The head pâtissier gave Mew’s phone back with polite smile. “And he will be off next Sunday.”

Mew raised his eyebrows with the turned out of events and smiling gratefully to the co-owner of the café. “So, next Sunday?” He turned back to the younger one and waited for his reply expectantly.

“I— uh, okay,” He nodded shyly, and Mew definitely didn’t missed out how Gulf reddened up to his ears.

“I will pick you up on your condo at 10am, okay?” He gave a last smile before he said goodbye and turned around to exited the pretty decorated café.

 _“P’Tong, what was that??!”_ Gulf huffed right away after he make sure that the older teacher was out of sight.

“Ah, please, Nong, I had enough of you two tiptoeing around each other,” Tong rolled his eyes, put back the dirty plates to the back kitchen. “It’s not like the feeling aren’t mutual...”

_“P’Tong—”_

“What? Am I saying the wrong thing?” The older one retorted back. “Anyway, your latest batch of chocolate pound cakes are done baking, get back to work!”

“Uh, so....,” Gulf started nervously when they already at Mew’s kitchen that surprisingly well equipped even though he claimed that he barely could cook. “What kind of cakes that your mom like, Phi?”

“Well,” He pondered a bit, trying to remember his mom’s favorite. “She prefer cakes without fruits on it? Like she didn’t really like sour things on desserts, I guess?”

“That’s pretty hard,” Gulf frowned, try to think and searching through one of his favorite cakes recipe book that he already used from his cooking school days. “Most of older people that I encounter prefer to have fresh cakes, like fruit cakes, kiwi cakes, or strawberry shortcake... Now I’m just confused on what to bake....” He then looked up to Mew’s eyes in question. “Does she prefer denser texture, soft texture, or a creamy one in desserts, Phi?”

“Come to think of it, my mom pretty fond of pie...,” He rapped his fingers on top of the kitchen counter, still thinking back on what his mom would like.

“Ah, good, since pie were relatively easy....,” Gulf nodded, making his hair bounced up cutely. “I’m already afraid if your mom prefer to have Opera Cake, Paris-brest, or Mille-feuille....” He released a sigh of relieved before asking where Mew put the butter, flour, and salt to make the pie crust first.

As he measured up the ingredients and mixed them with cold water in clean surface. He mindlessly told the older one that he didn’t really like to make puff pastry, bread, and macarons, “It’s so freaking hard, which was why I took the chocolate course when they asked us to choose our speciality back at school.”

“But, I thought chocolate is harder to handle? Since it's so much more delicate than pastries?” Mew asked curiously while he helped Gulf to take out the ingredients for the custard fillings.

“Well,” Gulf think a bit while he knead the dough carefully because he couldn’t let the butter to melted as he knead it to make the pie crust buttery and crusty. “Both of them were difficult on their own way? But I just prefer to handle chocolate, I guess.”

“Why do you take dessert as your speciality, anyway?” Mew asked curiously. “Since the aspects in cooking school is pretty wide? You definitely could take savoury course as your speciality, right?”

“Promise you won’t laugh?” Gulf bites his lips hesitantly, which replied with eager nodded from the older one. “So... my crush back in high school were crazy about dessert, and she told me that she dreamt of marrying a pastry chef.”

Despite the promise, the older one snorted either way, which only get Gulf pouted at him, _“P’Mew,_ you promised not to laugh...”

“Okay, so? You ended up with her afterwards?” He watched the younger one patted the dough for the last time and wrapped in plastic wrap before he let the dough rest in the freezer for 30 minutes.

“For a good 2 years, yeah, but we just drifted apart afterwards...” He sighed. It was already long time ago anyway, and he still date around time to time, so it wasn’t like he still think about her. "Well, life happened, there's that."

“But, don’t you feel somewhat demotivated on your career path afterwards? Since you choose it because of her?” Mew asked again while he cracked the eggs as the younger one told him to. “Don’t you think that it’s similar to someone that tattooed their lovers’ name over their body and they broken up afterwards? Like it's somewhat removable since you still have a trace of her somewhere?”

Gulf pondered a bit as he put the measured sugar, salt, and vanilla paste to the egg mixture and asked Mew to stir it. “I don’t think so? It’s different with tattoo, I guess, Phi. With tattoo, it’s a permanent mark. Whilst in education and career path, you could definitely developed yourself according to your personal interest, right?”

“However, you don’t even like dessert,” Mew watched the younger one put the scalded milk on top of the mixture before he asked him to stir it well again.

“I don’t like it, yes, but I’m not saying that I didn’t enjoy exploring with it,” Gulf tilted his head slightly as he inspecting wether the mixture was already well-mixed or not. He then decided to chopped chocolates quickly and put it into double boiler to melted it down.

“Is it possible?” Mew turned to Gulf when he watched him melting the chocolate slowly. “To actually enjoying exploring something that you didn’t even like?”

When Gulf turned his head, the younger one just glad that he currently not holding the piping hot glass mixing bowl because suddenly Mew’s face was so close, he absentmindedly hitched his breath.

“Tell me, Gulf, why you suddenly being nice to me when clearly you hate me before?” Mew’s eyes turned dark, it made him downright nervous.

“I—,” He gulped nervously and he avoided Mew’s stares just in time before the chocolate burnt, and he immediately turning off the stove.

“Hey, answer me,” He tilted his chin forward to made the younger one’s head turned to him again.

“So, you knew?” He looked up apologetically.

“Of course, I knew that you hated me, I’m not stupid,” Mew raised his eyebrows. “Well?” He waited for his previous answer.

“It’s just... whenever you’re coming, there’s a lot of girls coming to our place,” He answered truthfully.

“Huh? Is that true?” He asked confusedly. He clearly didn’t realized that, because he deemed that it was normal for a dessert place to be packed up with girls. Well a couple of girls did obviously hit him up, but it was always happening everywhere he went to, to the point where he stopped caring (not that he was being cocky, but, well, that was just the fact).

“I don’t think that’s a big problem?” He asked the younger one again.

“Well—,” Gulf unconsciously blushed, which clearly amused the older one since he wasn’t expecting it. “It’s just—“

Mew chuckled and raised Gulf to seat at kitchen counter so easily it makes the younger one surprised because he was definitely heavy. “Is it wrong if I assumed that you’re jealous, Nong?” Mew leaned forward to Gulf, which definitely made the younger one grew even more nervous. Mew then decided to tilted his head and move forward to silenced him with a kiss, which the younger one mindlessly reciprocate, which of course made the older one took it as a sign to deepened the kiss and slipped his tongue to the younger’s mouth, clearly enjoying to exploring the warm cavern. After seems like forever, he finally leaned back and smirked, _“So?”_

“Fine, I like you, Phi,” He huffed annoyedly, which just made the older one chuckled and kissed his left cheek fondly. “Now, let’s get back to work, I must have already let the chocolate turned cold and have to reheat it again... could you please take out the dough from the freezer, Phi?”

“Fine, Yai Nong~” Mew replied cheekily.

“Anyway, Phi,” Gulf asked as he pre-heat the oven and mixed the melted chocolate into the egg custard mixture and stir it quickly. “This cake is definitely for your mom, right? Not just stupid excuse for you to trapped me here?” He looked up to the other suspiciously while the older one just smiled sheepishly.

“What if I did making up an excuse?” 

_“P’Mew...”_

“Nah, I’m not lying, tomorrow is truly my mom’s birthday, do you want to meet her while bringing this cake?” He asked playfully.

 _“P’Mew—“_ Gulf huffed when he took out the rolling pin, flattened up the dough and put it into the pie moulds carefully.

“Kidding aside, but I did making up excuse to make my own cake for her to lure you here...” The older one winked to him, which just made Gulf nudged his ribcage. 

After he poked the dough with the fork to avoid the air to forming afterwards, he then poured the chocolate custard mixture and put it into the oven. When Gulf stretched his arms tiredly, he was surprised that he got hugged from behind. “What is it now, Phi?” He asked him tiredly, but still give him a small smile nonetheless.

“Is it okay if I call you my boyfriend from now on?” He then tucked his chin on the younger one’s right shoulder. _“Please?”_ He gave puppy eyes to Gulf, it was just too ridiculous, given that he’s far older, anyway, but it was still cute to him, either way.

“What if I say no, Phi?” The younger one decided to replied cheekily.

“Nong, I didn’t know that you were this cruel,” He pouted sadly, which just made Gulf snorted and laughed lightly. “Gulf, why are you playing around with my heart like this...” Gulf still smiling amusedly at the older one’s antics and he decided to give him a light peck, “Fine, Phi, whatever you say.” Which immediately made the older one move quickly to turning him around, cup his cheek and deepened the kiss properly. Gulf just laughed over the kiss, because they just need to wait for the pie to finished baking, anyway.

With a huge panic, Gulf opened his eyes through his blaring alarm from a far. He mindlessly searching to his phone with his hand but still couldn’t find it. _Where was his phone?_ He blinked his eyes to see the clock on the wall. 6.30. Shit, _shit, shit, shit._ He needed to be in his workplace by 7am. _Shitttt._ He winched slightly when he remembered what happened last night upon seeing the shirtless teacher on his left side. “P’Mew, P’Mew, P’Mew—,” He woke him up, nudged the other’s biceps repeatedly.

The older one just lazily opened his eyes, and reached to cupped his cheek softly, “Morning, sunshine.” Gulf definitely would consider it to be a definitely cute smile if not for him being late for work.

“P’Mew!!!! Wake up, I need to be at my workplace within 30 minutes, and my uniform is still in my condo!!!” Gulf raised from the bed and stumbled here and there because all of the scattered clothes all over the floor. As he reached for his shirt somewhere in the kitchen corner he just glad that he already gave the chocolate custard pie a finishing touch with a whipped cream and shaved chocolate last night before everything happened. Though he only shook his head disgustedly when he realized how messed up the kitchen was, with a lot of dirty dishes, not to mention that the older one have some crazy ideas which involved whipped cream and chocolate last night. _Sigh_. Well, it had been a while since he got a good laid, _but, still—_

He rushed out to the bathroom to take a quick shower and put yesterday’s clothes quickly because he will changed at his condo later, anyway. He went outside to asked the older one to hurry up because he took a long time on his ensuite bathroom, and pulled him outside right away when he finished dressed up and took the car keys.

“N’Gulf, I heard that you coming to P’Mew’s condo yesterday?” Mild smirked when he saw the younger one busily turning his keys, but of course that he just had to peering into Gulf’s life even when the younger one definitely in hurry to take something from his own place early in the morning.

“Morning, Phi, why are you so early, anyway?” He asked the older one back.

“I got morning class to teach today,” The older one smiling so sweetly it sacred the young chocolatier. “Now, don’t divert from my question.”

“Yeah, Phi... he asked me to taught him to bake a cake for his mom....” Gulf gave a tight smile to the older one.

“What kind of cake that you taught him to make until you have stay over at his place, Nong?” Mild smiled knowingly. “Or P’Mew also taught you something afterwards?”

That question ended up making Gulf unconsciously reddened up to his ears and decided to cut it short, “Uh, sorry, Phi, I really need to be in hurry because I have to be in my workplace in 15 minutes.” He smile sheepishly before he went inside to his own place, leaving the older one alone outside.

Mild just snorted when his guts were right, Mew’s familiar Audi still waited in front of their condo’s entrance door. He knocked the window and waited for the older one to rolled down the window, “So, the first boyfriend’s duty, isn’t it?” He smirked into the older one. Which just replied by a raised of eyebrows from the older teacher. “Fine, I got it that you don’t even have time to give me a lift to the uni, just don’t forget that you owe me that latest video game that I talked to you about, okay?” He gave a last salute to his friend before he walked to the entrance gate to find taxi.

Mew then watched Gulf in amusement when he hurriedly brought his bag from his place and immediately went inside the car and buckled up into the seatbelt, “Hurry up, Phi, I’m already late!!” Mew steal a kiss on his cheek before he started the engine and drove away.

“Who knows that I ended up regretting a bit that I helped you to get together with him, Ai’Gulf...,” Tong shook his head and sighed heavily at his subordinate as he watched the younger one typed into his phone in the back room.

He raised his head and asked innocently, “Yeah, Phi?”

“Your break time already done, Nong, let’s get back to work,” Tong tsked at the younger one. “Why are you keep texting him, anyway? Not that you aren’t got a lift from him today, and he even got a breakfast here, you guys literally just separated from each other for only a couple of hours by now.”

“I’m just asking if his mom found the custard pie to be delicious, Phi....” Gulf pouted and put his phone back on his back pocket.

“It’s just the honeymoon phase, Tong, let him be,” P’Boss snorted at his staff. Today he was checking for the store’s weekly performances, and he happened to bumped into his past TA when he was arrived at the café. Clearly amused to see how his staff and his TA apparently having totally different dynamic to what he was witnessing back in the food testing day. “So, you’re together _together_ right now?”

“Apparently, yes, I think,” Tong replied for him amusedly, when the younger chocolatier just avoided his bosses' questions and back into his station on the kitchen. However, he couldn’t lie by having his ears still appeared red from the question.

“Anyway, Tong, as per your request I already asked the supplier to stocked up the ingredients supply for the new year,” P’Boss said as he checked the weekly report, specifically from the Christmas holiday sales. “I guess, the orders and sales would be pretty similar with last year, right?”

“Well, I hope so,” Tong nodded and suddenly turned into the young chocolatier, “And _you_ , Gulf, please don’t forget that we need to work full shift on the new year eve, and the day of the new year, just in case you forgot and suddenly make a promise to go on a date with your boyfriend or something.”

“I’m _not_ forgetting about our work duty, Phi,” Gulf frowned, feeling offended.

“Ai’Nong, today was literally your first or second day being boyfriends yet you nearly coming late to work,” The pastry chef sighed tiredly.

“But, I’m not late, right?!” He retorted back.

“Yeah, you barely could make it, thanks to your boyfriend’s Audi, or else you would definitely late,” He rolled his eyes and turned back to his business partner who watched them with amusement earlier to discuss further about the sales performance for the past week.

Let’s just say that Gulf prefer to stay at the older one’s condo lately; because first, his neighbour couldn’t stop to get nosy about them, and second, he was apparently enjoying to be pampered with so much care. It had been a while since he was in relationship, and apparently it was pretty nice to have someone to be depended on, moreover when his boyfriend insisted to picked him up whenever he could. Not that Gulf was saying that he acted as if his boyfriend was basically his personal chauffeur, it was just bonus to all of the things that he already got.

As P’Mew rested his head lazily on his lap to watch Netflix, with some latest TV series that his boyfriend interested in, he suddenly raised his head to meet Gulf’s gaze.

“What’s wrong, Phi?” He asked confusedly, while still ruffling through the older one’s soft hair.

“I forgot to ask you... how about the new year merits...?” He look at the younger one expectantly. If there was anything that he learned from P’Mew lately, that apparently he was very religious and went to the temple very often if he had time to do merits and such. Therefore, it must be really means something for him to go to this new year merits.

“I have to work full shift on new year eve and new year, Phi...” He pouted sadly.

“But the café would be close at 10pm, right? We could still catch the merits, right?” He pleaded to the younger one and put his puppy face. “I will pick you up and give you a lift the day after, _pleaseee?”_ He raised his hand to softly touch the chocolatier’s cheeks.

Gulf didn’t realized it at first, but apparently the older one’s puppy face was one of his weaknesses. It was just— he always appeared to be so freaking perfect and handsome every single time in public. It amused him that he could acted this cute in front of him, and he was hopeful that this act was solely made for himself only. “Fine, Phi, but don’t you feel tired to drive me around?”

“At least the university was still on holiday, but _you’re_ not,” He caressed his boyfriend’s cheek softy before turned his face down for a kiss.

“Anyway, since tomorrow will be my day off, do you want to make strawberry dipped chocolate, Phi? I saw that you still have strawberries and leftovers chocolates on your fridge?” He offered to him.

“Do you think the same thing that I think?” Mew raised his eyebrows playfully.

 _“P’Mew....”_ Gulf huffed cutely, which made the older one chuckled and gave him another peck, "It's just that you often forget to finish your food in the fridge before it went bad. I don't want you to waste anymore food, you know."

“Fine, lead the way, our _monsoir chocolatier_...” He faked the french accent and raised his body so his boyfriend could walked into the kitchen.

Sometimes Gulf thought that everything move pretty fast. He got familiar with the kitchen whose definitely not his to begin with pretty fast, sometimes he wondered if it was a bad or a good thing. As he picked the chocolate and strawberries while waiting for the water to be boiled, he decided to chopped the chocolate quickly and cut the strawberries’ stems after he washed it with tap water. Though he was a quite person, Mew found it odd for him to suddenly went this silent, and he hugged him from behind after he made sure that the younger one already put down the knife and put the chocolate in the double boiler

“What’s wrong, my love?” He tugged his chin on the younger one’s shoulder.

“I don’t know... I’m just thinking....” Gulf sighed while he melted down the chopped chocolate and turning of the stove when he made sure it was all melted.

“Yeah?” He turned Gulf’s head to him softly, searching into his eyes.

“Is it okay to move forward this fast, Phi?” He pouted to the older one.

“Where do the sudden insecurities coming from?” Mew frowning confusedly.

“I don’t know.... perhaps I’m just scared because... what if everything went down as fast as everything settled down between us?” He looked down to avoided Mew’s gaze.

“Well,” Mew detached himself from the hug to turned the younger one to him. “I don’t think that we’re moving _that_ fast? We haven’t meet each other’s friends yet, you even avoided Mild even if he was your neighbour,” He chuckled. “The only friends that I knew from your life so far are only Tong and Boss, though they were technically your bosses,” He laughed lightly when the younger one pouted and said a small sorry. “It’s okay, I won’t push you, we still have a lot of time to explore and discover each other’s life. Though, I won’t lie that I want you to meet Chopper and my mom someday soon,” He smiled and ruffled the slightly tanned boy’s fluffy hair.

“I also understand with your schedule and day off that’s not like most of regular people, and that’s okay too,” He gently kissed Gulf’s cheeks and caressed it afterwards. “We met each other through your workplace, anyway, so if anything, I would only be grateful for its existence,” He laughed lightly and reached for one of the strawberries to dipped it into the melted chocolate, fed it to himself and raised his eyebrows. “Also, I always felt grateful for it to served the best desserts ever.”

“Why you always come to our place, anyway, Phi?” He asked curiously, since he started to notice a few small things whenever he come back and forth to the older one’s condo. “It will be much closer and easier for you to reached the Siam’s branch, you know.”

“Well, at first I did try your place out of curiosity since the decoration is prettier when I passed through it from the campus, albeit it was smaller than the Siam one,” Mew think back to those times. “At first, I just wanted to know if perhaps you served special flavours or not, or if the flavours consistent within each branch.”

“So? Our branch’s cakes were better then?” He smiled so smugly, Mew teasingly splattered his cheeks with melted chocolate, which immediately made the younger one huffed annoyedly.

“Honestly it was all taste the same within each branch. Well, Tong and Boss were definitely good to keep the food consistent in terms of flavours,” Mew nodded surely.

“So? Why the need to come back and forth to our place, anyway?” Gulf reached for the kitchen tissue to cleaned up his cheeks and hands.

“For starters, it was smaller and more quite... and I like quite place better, especially when I had my breakfast and did some of the grading or any kind of work...” He dipped another strawberry to the chocolate and offered it into the younger one’s, waited for him to opened up his mouth.

“And second, the Siam branch doesn’t have a cute frowny chocolatier at their establishment,” He let out a small knowing smile when the younger one suddenly reddened up to his ears, a thing that the older one noticed was a habit everytime Gulf went shy or overwhelmed. He watched the younger one gulped down the strawberry slowly and then hesitatingly looked up with Mew’s face with a shy face. “Why? The strawberry isn’t taste good enough?”

“Pretty okay,” Gulf coughed lightly to masked his own shyness. “You stocked up pretty good chocolate, although I have to tell you that if you eat chocolate in daily basis, you better stocked up Callebout rather than Lindt since it’s—,” The older one cut down his words through a deepened kiss that definitely tasted like a melted dark chocolate. Mew definitely could get used to it, to enjoy the taste of chocolate every seconds of his life, be it through dessert, or through his lovers’ sweet cavern that he never get bored to explored.

“Do you like sweets better now?” Mew pulled a smirk when he noticed the younger one dazed out from the kiss, his pupil blown so wide Mew couldn’t wait to take him to the bed quickly.

“I.... could get used to it.... _maybe,”_ He blushed even further. Mew smirked and took it as a call to take things further with the leftovers strawberries and chocolate.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i think it's been a while since i wrote something light without a life lesson on it?? lolololol. i hope you would enjoying this story as much as i enjoy writing it! <33 kudos and comments are highly appreciated :) :) <33 xx


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